Friday, October 31, 2014

Well, the time has come. Today IS Halloween, and welcome to Day 31 of the 31 Days of Halloween Blog Hop. As you know by now, I have been participating in this month-long blog hop with some extremely talented artists. The complete list of Wicked Bloggers (that's what we are called) are in my side bar. There are lots of prizes in the daily scavenger hunt, and a Grand Prize worth over $300.

To see all of the rules and regulations for 31 Days of Halloween 2014, please visit THIS POST.

To see Scavenger Hunt winners from previous days, please visit THIS PAGE

I have a fun little card for you today that I really enjoyed making. I felt it very fitting for the last day of this wonderful blog hop. What more says Halloween than all those pocket watches representing the time is now, today's date, the raven, and the moon?

Die cut moon and stars from yellow card stock. To change the color of the moon die, I first added Wedding Dress Memento Luxe ink to surface, then used a makeup sponge to blend distress ink colors in Scattered Straw, Mustard Seed, and Gathered Twigs. This knocked down the bright yellow color of the paper.

I thought it needed a bit more definition, so I went around the moon shape with a charcoal pencil and blended it with my finger and a blending stump.

Die cut raven from thick chipboard.

Color raven with the Derwent inktense blocks and a water brush or wet paint brush. Add an animal eye. I think you can see in the photo where I added a bit of navy blue to the raven where his wings are. Black birds always have a blue tint to their black feathers. Oh my goodness, he looks so real with that animal eye.

I want to thank everyone for following along with me on my 31 Days of Halloween journey. I was not sure I would be able to post a project every day, but you all helped make it easy for me to want to share my art with you. I appreciate you all so very much, and a big hug to each and every one of you!

Thursday, October 30, 2014

Welcome to Day 30 of the 31 Days of Halloween Blog Hop. As you know by now, I am participating in this month-long blog hop with some extremely talented artists. The complete list of Wicked Bloggers (that's what we are called) are in my side bar. There are lots of prizes in the daily scavenger hunt, and a Grand Prize worth over $300.

To see all of the rules and regulations for 31 Days of Halloween 2014, please visit THIS POST.

To see Scavenger Hunt winners from previous days, please visit THIS PAGE

Today, I want to share my witch's hat that I am also entering into The Robin's Nest Witch Hat Contest. All that was required was to use 50% or more of their products. Apologies in advance. There are lots of photos in this post.

Oh look, there's Skully again. I guess he got tired of sitting on top of the apothecary jar. Looks like he's hitching a ride on that witch's hat!

There are lots of patterns and templates for making your own witch hat, but I chose to start with this paper maché hat I found at my local craft store. I wanted it to be sturdy, and I think this will do it.

Next, I chose this beautiful Stencil Green/Plum paper for my hat. I took a 12x12 piece of it, gently folding in half both directions to find center, and made a cut in both directions.

I pushed the center of the hat through the opening, adjusting my cuts as needed to get the paper to lay flat on the brim.

I adhered the paper to the brim with PPA bookbinding glue, smoothing the paper with my fingers and a bone folder. As you can see, I had to make some more snips in the paper to get it to lay flat against the brim.

I trimmed the paper around the outer edge of the brim, leaving approximately 1" - 2", snipping every 1/2" or so around the circumference. I turned the edges of over and adhered to the underside of the brim to make a neat edge.

To cover the cone shaped top, first measure the circumference (16") and the height (8").

Height = 8"

Circumference = 16"

Begin adhering each triangle to the cone shaped top, overlapping, if necessary.

Luckily, 16" divides easily into four 4" strips, 8" long. Make yourself a couple of templates from computer printer paper. First, fold the paper in half along the 8-1/2" side. Mark 2" out from the center fold and make a pencil mark. Use a ruler to draw a line from the 2" mark up to the top of the fold. When you open it up, you will have a triangle. Do this twice to have two templates. Now you can get all four triangles from one piece of 12x12 paper.

Cut the four triangles out from your paper, as shown, turning the template point up, then point down, to get the most from your sheet.

Trace around the brim of the hat and cut out another piece of the Stencil Green/Plum paper. Adhere to the underside of the brim with the PPA glue. Cut slits in the center towards the brim.

Make as many slits as necessary to allow the paper to easily fold inward.

Adhere the slits to the inside with more PPA glue.

Paint the inside of the hat with black gesso. I used the same sponge brush that I used for the PPA glue.

I applied a coat of Copper Gilder's Paste around the edge of the brim to hide the white edges of the paper after being cut.

I used Dusty Concord distress stain to disguise the cut white edges where I had joined the four triangles on the top of the hat. It matched perfectly when it dried.

I next tried to adhere black netting that held produce to the bottom section of the hat.

I used too much adhesive and removed the netting. Much to my surprise, it left this awesome texture, as though the netting was still attached.

So, I used my happy accident and simply added more Dusty Concord distress stain over the adhesive. Some of the ink is not dry yet, but it will match very well when it does. You have to admit, it does look like the netting is still adhered, doesn't it?

Now to start making the embellishments. Stamp Vintage Florets in different sizes onto the gold glitter card stock with Spiced Chai StazOn,

Die cut each flower with the matching die.

Shape flowers with large ball stylus and glue petal layers together.

Add Champagne Stickles glitter glue to the petals. I also added a Goldenberry dew drop to the center of the smallest flower.

Punch multiple sizes of daisies from the Brick Glitter Cardstock. Shape each one, pinching the ends to make them more spiky looking, and adhere layers together. Mist with the Coral glimmer mist.

Spray a length of creepy cloth with water and Dylusions Fresh Lime ink spray. When dry, adhere to band of hat, overlapping ends.

Use dies to cut six bats from the black glitter chipboard. Cut a length of wire and sandwich the wire between two bats. You will make three bats total.

Die cut a couple of bare trees and twigs from the gold glitter chipboard. Use the Orange Zest StazOn to give it a more copper color.

Die cut two spiders to adhere together, and enough of the fence edge from black glitter chipboard to go around the hat.

Arrange and adhere the embellishments as shown in the photos below.

Uh oh, what's that? Is that spider creeping up on skull? Ewwwwww!

And a bit of a closer look at my flower bouquet.

A look at the back. There are spiders crawling all over this hat!

And here are those bats flying around like gnats on something with a stench. Ewwww again!

Whew, that was a doozy. I hope you are still hanging in there with me and that you enjoyed my project today. I have to say, I had an awfully fun time making this hat, and I hope I have inspired you to try making one for yourself.

I hope you are still enjoying the hop, and tomorrow is the last day. I will be sad to see it go, but will take a few days to rest after this fun-filled, but busy, month.

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Welcome to Day 29 of the 31 Days of Halloween Blog Hop. Not too much longer before the big day!!! As you know by now, I am participating in this month-long blog hop with some extremely talented artists. The complete list of Wicked Bloggers (that's what we are called) are in my side bar. There are lots of prizes in the daily scavenger hunt, and a Grand Prize worth over $300.

To see all of the rules and regulations for 31 Days of Halloween 2014, please visit THIS POST.

To see Scavenger Hunt winners from previous days, please visit THIS PAGE

I used this same stamp on a previous post in a different way. This time, I made doors that open using it. You have to wait til the end to see what awaits inside! There's only one way in, and only one way out!!!

Stamp flourish grid twice onto white card stock. I used VersaFine black ink and silver embossing powder. I wanted the two colors to mix when I heated the EP, so it would look like weathered iron. The bottom half, or doors, only need to be stamped a second time.

Add tabs to one of the door pieces, as shown in the photo below.

Cut the door pieces out and use the door piece without flaps to measure an opening on your top layer of printed card stock. These two pieces are just laying on the paper for me to gauge where to trace around the doors.

Cut out opening in the blue Iron Works print paper, as shown.

Score along the tabbed edges. Center and adhere second door piece, making sure they both go in the same direction. Ink edges with Faber-Castell Black Big Brush Art Pen.

Blend Rusty Hinge, Gathered Twigs, and Salty Ocean on both sides of door pieces. Color the half circle door topper the same way and set aside.

Use an ink blusher to apply Radiant Neon ink in Electric Orange and Electric Yellow, blending the two colors where they meet.

Align the image through the window opening and adhere to the reverse side of the blue print paper. Adhere only the top and bottom of the image to the frame. Leave the left and right sides open so you can slip the tabbed doors through in the following steps.

Slip each tabbed door through the opening and adhere, ensuring you have not covered up the score line. You want the doors to be able to open freely. The picture below shows the left door being inserted into the opening.

Here, both doors are inserted and adhered, one door open for your to see.

Stamp long border twice from the Metal Madness stamp set onto white card stock with Black StazOn ink. Color blend with Gathered Twigs. Trim to size, edge with Faber-Castell Black Big Brush Art Pen and adhere over door. Add door topper on top of that piece. I later added the second stamped border to the bottom of the door to "ground" it so it did not look like it was floating.

I added a couple of tiny metal stickers to the doors for door knobs.

I used the shatter stencil in both top corners and sponged some brown and black soot ink through it. To bring out the webs a bit more, I added a white charcoal pencil to the web lines.

I stamped "One Way" from the Urban Grunge stamp set with Emerald StazOn ink onto white card stock, then punch with a decorative label punch. Adding some more of the Radiant Neon ink in Electric Orange and Electric Yellow again gave it that look, and edged with a bit of brown distress ink. Pop dotted the label for dimension.

I added a couple of dimensional spider stickers to the web and beneath the One Way sign.

I felt it needed a tad bit more embellishing, so I die cut these black roses from black glitter card stock with a Cuttlebug die and added them to each side of the doors.

And here is the scene you see when you open the doors. If your a a fan of "The Walking Dead", this barbed wire fence with black birds flying overhead, waiting to see if it is safe to go eat some of the rotting flesh below, is what I was thinking when I saw this stamp image. Not a pretty sight when you think of it that way. Bwaaaahaaahaaaa!